Hauppauge's new multi-standard TV receiver works with NTSC and PAL TV

TV tuner specialist Hauppauge recently announced a multi-standard TV receiver designed for computers running either Windows or Linux. Specifically, the WinTV-HVR-1975 works with the NTSC standard used in North America as well as the PAL TV encoding system that’s popular in Europe.

In a statement on the matter, Ken Plotkin, president of Hauppauge, said their professional TV receiver customers have been looking for a universal TV tuner for Europe and North America. The WinTV-HVR-1975 supports the most popular TV formats in both of these regions, he added.

The new tuner also supports ATSC HD, QAM digital cable, DVB-T, DVB-T2 and DVB-C broadcasting standards. Coupled with all of these standards, Hauppauge believes they are delivering a TV receiver which is as close to universal as possible.

As Digital Trends points out, each new product in the WinTV-HVR-19XX line also includes hardware-based video encoders that convert broadcasts into MPEG-2 format. This move will, according to the company, reduce the overall load of the host system’s CPU.

The new USB-based tuners will arrive with both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows driver support. What’s more, it’ll be compatible with Windows XP through 8.1. With Linux, the company expects most applications will involve digital signage, sports equipment and hospital patient entertainment systems, just to name a few.

The retail version of the WinTV-HVR-1975, the WinTV-HVR-1950, is mentioned in the press release although the specs for the 1950 don’t show support for PAL TV. The 1950 retails for $129 but there’s no mention of the 1975 on the company’s site. I’ve dispatched a message to Hauppauge for clarification and will update this story accordingly with their reply.

Update: I received the following reply from Hauppauge regarding the missing -1975 addressed above.

At this time we do not see a retail market for the multi-tuner version in the USA. We will sell the HVR-1950 version to places like Best Buy and Amazon for the retail market. If an end user wanst the HVR-1975 it will be added to the website soon to purchase it directly from Hauppauge at a price of $139. The HVR-1975 is wanted by OEM so they can purchase one unit and have it function in different markets. We are expecting the first run of the boards next week.